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Rev. Dr. Robert Chao Romero is “Asian-Latino,” and has been a professor of Chicana/o Studies and Asian American Studies at UCLA since 2005. He received his Ph.D. from UCLA in Latin American History and his Juris Doctor from U.C. Berkeley. Romero has published more than 30 academic books and articles on issues of race, immigration, history, education, and religion, and received the Latina/o Studies book award from the international Latin American Studies Association. His recent book, “Brown Church: Five Centuries of Latina/o Social Justice, Theology, and Identity (2020),” received the InterVarsity Press Readers’ Choice Award for best academic title. Romero is a former Ford Foundation and U.C. President’s Postdoctoral Fellow, as well as a recipient of the Louisville Institute’s Sabbatical Grant for Researchers. Robert is also an ordained minister and community organizer.
Ryan Burge is an Assistant Professor of Political Science as well as the Graduate Coordinator at Eastern Illinois University. He teaches in a variety of areas, including American institutions, political behavior, and research methods. His research focuses largely on the interaction of religiosity and political behavior (especially in the American context).
He has published over twenty articles in a number of peer reviewed journals including Politics & Religion, the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, the Review of Religious Research, the Journal of Religious Leadership, Representation, Politics & Gender, Politics, Groups, and Identities, the Journal of Communication and Religion, the Journal of Religion, Media and Digital Culture and the Social Science Computer Review.
He is also the author of The Nones: Where They Came From, Who They Are, and Where They Are Going, in which he details a comprehensive picture of Americans who say they have no religious affiliation. This book explains how this rise happened, who the nones are, and what they mean for the future of American religion. His second book, 20 Myths About Religion and Politics in America, was released in March of 2022.